We are one of the few countries that even keep statistics. What's going on in Russia, China or India? Does anyone know? Does anyone in south or central America even keep body counts? These like most statistics are easily manipulated and mostly bullshit.

The most meaningful statistic - murder rates - is glaring in it's omission.

In 2006, most major US cities had murder rates (deaths per 100,000) higher than Iraq, during the height of the Iraq war.

In 1990, there were 2245 murders/homicides in New York for a city with 7.5 million people. To put that into perspective, there have been 4770 US servicemen killed in Iraq, after 10 years of war and all the effort that has entailed.